My new memoir WOODEN & ME is also available here at Amazon

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Pooh Bear No Match For These Tears

When my daughter was very young and in daycare, I would frequently pick her up and take her out on a lunch “date.” We always had a wonderful time, but when I would drop her off again so I could go back to work, she always cried.

And cried and cried, so much so that her grandmotherly caregiver eventually suggested it might be best to stop these noontime excursions.

Celine and Dallas lighting up Paris with their smiles.

The next time I dropped Dallas off after a lunch outing, I tried something crazy and gave her one of her favorite stuffed animals to remind her of me, and our bedtime reading ritual, as she went down for her afternoon nap.

Winnie the Pooh worked like a charm. The tears stopped and our dates continued.

Fast forward just over a dozen years. After hugging Dallas goodbye on move-in day her freshman year in college, I handed her a small stuffed Winnie the Pooh. Through her tears came a smile.

I needn’t have worried, of course. Minutes after we left, Dallas’ very first new college friend walked into her dorm room. This human Winnie the Pooh’s name was Celine. She lived across the hallway and came bearing an extra Popsicle.

Instant friends, they became roommates the following three years, and lasting friends who after graduation visited each other around the globe from Los Angeles and San Francisco to London and Paris, the latter where Celine moved to pursue a career in fashion.

Early Monday morning my daughter called me, heartbreak like I’ve never heard in her voice: “Celine is dead, Daddy.”

Celine was in India for a friend’s wedding and while riding in a taxi was hit by a bus. Twenty-six is far too young to lose your life and 27 is far too young to lose a best friend.

Talking to Dallas on the phone numerous times daily since – in truth, mostly listening to her because really a parent is hopelessly impotent to help in any other way in such a tragic time – I have been reminded of those long ago nights reading to her about another friendship, from A.A. Milne’s classic “Winnie the Pooh,” and specifically the passage where Christopher Robin tells Pooh Bear:

“If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together, there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”

Celine, in a way, gave this same gift to Dallas, who recalls: “Freshman year of college, when I broke up with my first real boyfriend, I remember fleeing to her room, sobbing, and she hugged me as I cried.

“Another time, when I was feeling down on myself because ‘no boys were ever going to like me, ever!’ she played me the song ‘Somebody’s Baby’ by Phantom Planet, saying it made her think of me because I was ‘so awesome that guys probably just assume you’re already taken.’ I still smile and think of her when I hear that song. Celine saw the very best in me, even when I didn’t see it in myself.”

The last time my daughter saw Celine was before Dallas’ birthday this past May. They caught up for brunch before Celine caught her flight back to Paris.

“I had a cold and I remember wondering whether I should cancel,” Dallas remembers. “I didn’t want to spread my germs to Celine, or to anyone else my path would cross on my commute into the city. But we were able to see each other so rarely that I thought, ‘To hell with it, I’m going!’ And I’m so grateful I did. We had a lovely visit, chatting in the sunshine over hot coffee and tea and scones, and before we hugged goodbye in the BART station I remembered to snap a photo.”

One could not wish to see two happier faces in a final selfie together.

Here is what Christopher Robin also tells Pooh Bear: “But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart . . . I’ll always be with you.”

He should have added, “Here, Pooh, have a Popsicle.”

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Check out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

• Personalized signed copies are available at WoodyWoodburn.com
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